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The Aksa Martyrs' Brigades group announced on Sunday that it its members have succeeded in manufacturing chemical and biological weapons to be used against Israel.

In a leaflet distributed in the Gaza Strip, the group, which belongs to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party, said the weapons were the result of an effort that has lasted for three years.

The statment was a response to an Israeli Security Cabinet decision to give the IDF the green light to prepare all the forces necessary for a military operation against Gaza terror cells.

As of 9:00 p.m. a large contingency of Golani and Givati Brigade infantry troops, along with elite units, were amassing on the Israeli side of the Gaza security fence for a possible ground operation there to rescue kidnapped soldier Cpl. Gilad Shalit.

According to the statement, the first of its kind, the group managed to manufacture and develop at least 20 different types of biological and chemical weapons.

The group said its members would not hesitate to add the new weapons to long-range rockets that are being fired at Israeli communities almost every day. It also threatened to use the weapons against IDF soldiers if Israel carried out its threats to invade the Gaza Strip.

"We want to tell [Prime Minister Ehud] Olmert and [Defense Minister Amir] Peretz that your threats don't frighten us," the leaflet said. "We will surprise you with our new weapons the moment the first soldier sets his foot in the Gaza Strip."

Hamas militants attack Israeli military outpost
By Dion Nissenbaum
Knight Ridder Newspapers

JERUSALEM - For the first time since its leaders took control of the Palestinian government in March, Hamas militants led a sophisticated pre-dawn attack Sunday on an Israeli military outpost along the Gaza border, killing two soldiers and abducting a third.

The raid created the most serious crisis here since Israel pulled out of the Gaza Strip last summer.

Israeli tanks almost immediately moved into the fringes of the Gaza Strip, talks between rival Palestinian factions over ending attacks inside Israel fell apart, and Egyptian diplomats worked feverishly to prevent the situation from spinning out of control.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and his military leaders warned the Palestinian government that it would be held responsible for the safety of the kidnapped soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, 19.

"We intend to respond to what happened this morning in such a way that everyone involved will know the price they will pay will be painful, and if the situation does not change, will hurt sevenfold," said Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz.

It was unclear whether the attack could have taken place without the knowledge of top-level Hamas leaders. Nor was it clear how long the operation had been planned. In taking credit for the attack, militants called it retaliation for several recent Israeli raids, but the Palestinians attacked the Israeli outpost through a 700-yard tunnel that Capt. Noa Meir of the Israel Defense Forces said would have taken months to dig.

The new Hamas-led government urged militants holding Shalit to keep him safe, but stopped short of calling for his release. Israel's Cabinet met late Sunday night to weigh its options and reportedly cleared the way for a possible rescue attempt before staging a wider military assault.

But efforts to free Shalit could be tempered by painful memories of past efforts to rescue kidnapped Israelis. In 1994, another 19-year-old soldier, Israeli-American Nachson Waxman, was kidnapped by Hamas militants and killed five days later during a failed Israeli rescue mission.

Sunday's attack came as Hamas leaders were working out the final details of an agreement with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to halt attacks inside Israel.

Abbas, who leads the more moderate Fatah party, joined Israel in criticizing Hamas for staging the raid just as the two sides were finalizing a deal that would have barred such attacks.

Sunday's attack took place before dawn at an Israeli army outpost near the Kerem Shalom kibbutz, which lies just inside Israel at Gaza's southern end. The kibbutz is about four miles southeast of Rafah and about two miles northeast of the Egyptian border.

Using a tunnel more than a third of a mile long, three teams of Palestinian commandoes surprised soldiers at the outpost with mortars, machine guns and hand grenades.

The tunnel, which began under a Palestinian home 400 yards inside the Gaza Strip, stretched 300 yards into Israel.

At least two of the Palestinian militants were wearing Israeli military uniforms during the assault.

Two Israeli soldiers were killed and four others wounded, the Israeli military said.

Two Palestinians were also killed, but five or six others managed to escape back into the Gaza Strip with Shalit, who was seen walking with his captors, the Israeli military said.

The raid - dubbed "Operation Fading Illusion" by the attackers - marked the first time since Hamas took over the Palestinian government that its militant wing has launched such an assault inside Israel. Until this month, Hamas had largely stood by a 16-month cease-fire with Israel as smaller militant groups launched suicide bombings and other attacks on Israelis.

But Hamas called off its cease-fire in early June after a series of inflammatory deaths. First, Israel assassinated a top Hamas security official and leading Gaza Strip militant, Jamal Abu Samhadana, in an aerial missile strike. The following day, eight Palestinian civilians out for a day at the beach were killed in an explosion during an Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip coast.

An Israeli military investigation declared that none of its shells hit the Palestinians that afternoon, but the findings are in dispute, and Hamas immediately resumed launching rudimentary rockets into southern Israel.

The Hamas military wing joined Samhadana's Popular Resistance Committees and a new group called the Islamic Army in taking credit for the attack, calling it a response to the recent Israeli attacks, including three botched missile strikes that killed 13 Palestinian civilians in the past two weeks.

"The operation is a natural response to the occupation crimes and massacres against the Palestinian people," said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri. "Hamas will continue to resist as long as there is occupation."

Sunday's kidnapping was the first since 2000, when three Israeli soldiers were kidnapped and killed by Hezbollah forces on Israel's border with Lebanon. Their bodies were returned to Israel four years later as part of a prisoner exchange.

Knight Ridder Newspapers special correspondent Cliff Churgin contributed to this report from Jerusalem.

SirNitram wrote:I'm hesitant to beleive this. Producing viable biological agents in three years? Unless we're talking chucking infested meat at people or doing similar to the water supply, that's unlikely. The infrastructure doesn't exist in the Strip.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has refused to release any Palestinian prisoners in exchange for information about an abducted Israeli soldier.

He was responding to a demand from three militant groups that women and youths be freed from Israeli jails in return for news on Gilad Shalit.

Those making the demand included the armed wing of governing party Hamas.

Mr Olmert also threatened military action to free the soldier seized in clashes on the Gaza border on Sunday.

Hamas political leaders have denied any knowledge of the tank gunner's whereabouts - but they have called for him to be well treated.

'Time running out'

Mr Olmert has put the army on standby for an extensive military operation against Palestinian militants to free Cpl Shalit and Israeli tanks and armoured vehicles have been assembling on the Gaza border.

"The question of freeing [Palestinian] prisoners is in no way on the Israeli government agenda," Mr Olmert said during a speech in Jerusalem.

Gilad Shalit
The 19-year-old soldier was seized by militants on Sunday

"There will be no negotiations, no bargaining, no agreements."

Mr Olmert said that Israel would not allow itself to become the victim of "Hamas-terrorist blackmail", warning that "a large-scale military operation is approaching".

"The time is approaching for a comprehensive, sharp and severe Israeli operation. We will not wait forever," Mr Olmert said.

Cpl Shalit is believed to have been taken captive by militants who tunnelled out of Gaza to attack the army post at Kerem Shalom.

Two Israeli troops and two militants were killed during the raid.

Diplomatic efforts

The faxed statement calling for the prisoners' release was signed by the Popular Resistance Committees umbrella group, Hamas's Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, and the previously unknown Army of Islam.

It said: "The Occupation [Israel] will not get any information about its missing soldier until it commits to the following:

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"First, the immediate release of all women in prison. Second, the immediate release of all children in prison younger than 18."

Israel is believed to have incarcerated about 100 women and 300 under-18s among the 9,000 Palestinian prisoners it is holding in its jails.

Intense diplomatic efforts have been under way since the soldier's disappearance, including mediation by an Egyptian delegation in the Gaza Strip.

This was noted by the kidnappers themselves, who said their demands were "in response to various mediation efforts and other intervention".

The statement did not confirm whether the three groups were holding Cpl Shalit captive themselves.

Israeli officials say they hold Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, of Hamas, responsible for the 19-year-old Israeli's safety.

Correspondents say the crisis could spoil efforts to bind Hamas into a plan implicitly recognising Israel, and may expose divisions between hardline and more pragmatic Hamas elements.

Ace Pace wrote:They fired off a rocket, IDF denies any such rocket fired.